M’s talking to Carlos
Says Mr. Delgado. Does seem as if Baltimore’s got the stronger hand, but at that point I’m reading into the article a little.
Backman fired
Well, that didn’t take long. Bob Melvin is expected to be named the new manager of the Diamondbacks. Say what you will about Bob, but he’s clearly a better choice than Wally Backman. With any luck, this will cause Backman to rethink some of his life choices, and hopefully make some changes.
The interesting thing to watch will now be if Melvin will request permission to talk to Bryan Price about the Arizona pitching coach position. I’d imagine he won’t, considering they’ve already officially named Price as the M’s pitching coach, but it is a longshot possibility that he won’t be with the organization come next spring.
Beltran
Well, here’s strike one on Carlos Beltran:
Houston Astros free agent center fielder Carlos Beltran is seeking a 10-year contract, his agent told a television station on Thursday.
There’s just no way you want to lock yourselves into his age 35-37 seasons at his current market value. This is probably just posturing, but if Boras really wants a 10 year deal for Beltran, just move right to Beltre.
More on Backman
You’ll recall that Dave expressed a pretty low opinion about Wally Backman’s fitness to be the new Diamondbacks manager (well, maybe not so much anymore). For those who haven’t followed, check out what’s happening. Backman’s having some issues emerge, and what’s maybe more disturbing than the actual incidents is that he’s pretty much evading responisiblity entirely… for any of it.
So, there you go.
Free Agent Rankings
In case you’re curious, Jim Callis has provided the complete list of free agent rankings that will determine compensation. Remember that a player must be offered arbitration for compensation to apply, however. Here’s the list:
Type A
Moises Alou (ChC), Wilson Alvarez (LA), *Tony Batista (Mon), Carlos Beltran (Hou), Adrian Beltre (LA), Armando Benitez (Fla), Jeromy Burnitz (Col), Orlando Cabrera (Bos), Miguel Cairo (NYY), Vinny Castilla (Col), Royce Clayton (Col), *Roger Clemens (Hou), Rheal Cormier (Phi), Carlos Delgado (Tor), J.D. Drew (Atl), Cal Eldred (StL), Steve Finley (LA), Nomar Garciaparra (ChC), Mark Grudzielanek (ChC), Chris Hammond (Oak), Dustin Hermanson (SF), Richard Hidalgo (NYM), Jeff Kent (Hou), Steve Kline (StL), Corey Koskie (Min), *Al Leiter (NYM), Esteban Loaiza (NYY), Derek Lowe (Bos), Matt Mantei (Ari), Edgar Martinez (Sea), Pedro Martinez (Bos), Mike Matheny (StL), Kent Mercker (ChC), Dan Miceli (Hou), Damian Miller (Oak), Kevin Millwood (Phi), Matt Morris (StL), Jeff Nelson (Tex), Magglio Ordonez (CWS), Russ Ortiz (Atl), Carl Pavano (Fla), Troy Percival (Ana), Odalis Perez (LA), Placido Polanco (Phi), Brad Radke (Min), Joe Randa (KC), Edgar Renteria (StL), Richie Sexson (Ari), Paul Shuey (LA), *Ugueth Urbina (Det), Jason Varitek (Bos), Omar Vizquel (Cle), David Wells (SD), *Woody Williams (StL), Scott Williamson (Bos), Jaret Wright (Atl).Type B
Terry Adams (Bos), Antonio Alfonseca (Atl), Roberto Alomar (CWS), Rich Aurilia (SD), Danny Bautista (Ari), Dave Burba (SF), Chris Carpenter (StL), Matt Clement (ChC), Craig Counsell (Mil), Deivi Cruz (SF), *Mike DeJean (NYM), Elmer Dessens (LA), Brook Fordyce (TB), Chad Fox (Fla), Alex Gonzalez (SD), Juan Gonzalez (KC), Cristian Guzman (Min), Jose Hernandez (LA), Orlando Hernandez (NYY), Todd Jones (Phi), Barry Larkin (Cin), Curtis Leskanic (Bos), Cory Lidle (Phi), *Jon Lieber (NYY), Jose Lima (LA), Tino Martinez (TB), Brent Mayne (LA), *Jose Mesa (Phi), Doug Mirabelli (Bos), Greg Myers (Tor), Hideo Nomo (LA), John Olerud (NYY), Antonio Osuna (SD), Todd Pratt (Phi), Steve Reed (Col), *B.J. Surhoff (Bal), Jose Valentin (CWS), Robin Ventura (LA), Ron Villone (Sea), Todd Walker (ChC), Gabe White (Cin), Dan Wilson (Sea), Paul Wilson (Cin), Esteban Yan (Det), Eric Young (Tex), Gregg Zaun (Tor).Type C
Sandy Alomar Jr. (CWS), Carlos Baerga (Ari), Kris Benson (NYM), Henry Blanco (Min), Ricky Bottalico (NYM), Jermaine Dye (Oak), Shawn Estes (Col), Julio Franco (Atl), Troy Glaus (Ana), Todd Greene (Col), Ben Grieve (ChC), John Halama (TB), Roberto Hernandez (Phi), *Todd Hollandsworth (ChC), Travis Lee (NYY), Al Levine (Det), *John Mabry (StL), Ramon Martinez (ChC), Jim Mecir (Oak), Eric Milton (Phi), Mike Redmond (Fla), Desi Relaford (KC), Rudy Seanez (Fla), Aaron Sele (Ana), Ismael Valdez (Fla), Todd Van Poppel (Cin), Bob Wickman (CWS), Tony Womack (StL).
Don’t you just love a system that thinks Ron Villone and Matt Clement are equals?
Adrian Beltre
Continuing with the short profiles on upcoming free agents, this one will be shorter than most others. Thanks to some in depth conversations we had on Beltre earlier this year, I thought I already wrote him up, but realized that I have not. We have two pretty good threads on him here and here, if you’re looking for more talk about Beltre. On to the mini-mini-article.
How much has Adrian Beltre improved his stock in the past year? Consider this quote from an August 4th, 2003 article by Peter Gammons: Will Adrian Beltre even get a big league, $500,000 contract next spring?
At that point, Beltre was in the middle of a .240/.290/.424 season and posting his third consecutive disappointing season. At the age of 24, he didn’t appear to be getting any better. Heading into this season, PECOTA projected him to hit .257/.311/.442, a modest increase but still an average player. Instead, he hit .334/.388/.629 and was one of the best players in baseball. The improvement was of historic proportions; it was just a huge leap over his last three years, which causes many to feel that it was an outlier and he’ll return to mediocrity after signing an enormous contract this fall.
I don’t happen to be in that category. You’ll hear quite often that 2004 was Beltre’s “first good year”, but that’s not really true. In 1999, at the age of 20, Beltre hit .275/.352/.428, drew 61 walks, and tossed in 18 stolen bases for good measure. The next year, still just 21, he hit .290/.360/.475, and all the markers pointed towards superstardom. He dominated the minor leagues, coming up through the system as a teenager and being annointed as the top prospect in baseball. He was already a terrific performer by age 21, and the performance matched the hype. There was little reason to think Beltre wouldn’t become one of the premier talents in major league baseball.
Then, in 2001, he had an emergency apendectomy in the Dominican Republic which went very wrong. He lost huge amounts of weight and strength and had to have several corrective medical procedures aimed at getting him healthy. It didn’t work, and he proceeded to struggle through the season. 2002 and 2003 brought the same mediocrity, but 2004 saw the return of Beltre’s talents. He has a history of being a terrific talent, and 2004 was not the first time he had flashed the potential to be a superstar.
So how good was Beltre last year? Once you factor in his terrific defense at third base, he was probably the second best player in the game. VORP ranks him 5th offensively, but Helton, Pujols, and Guerrero offer significantly less with the glove. But read those namees again; rather than splitting hairs, just look at the company he’s in. Bonds. Pujols. Guerrero. Adrian Beltre is pretty freaking good. At his prime level, he’s not a second tier star; he’s an MVP candidate.
How good should we expect Beltre to be in the future? That’s a bit trickier. It’s hard to believe that his .334 average was for real, after posting BA’s in the .260 range for most of his career. While his increased power certainly helped, he also saw a dramatic increase in the amount of singles as a percentage of non-HR balls in play (22 % in 2004, 15 % career). Singles are notoriously inconsistent, so for the sake of argument, let’s assume he reverts back to his career norm. That would cost him 32 singles, and his BA would plummet from .334 to .281, which would still be good enough to make an all-star player. However, I don’t believe we can realistcally assume that all the improvement was noise; he was geniunely hitting the crap out of the ball last year, and hard hit balls are obviously more likely to get through than dribblers up the line. At worst, I think we can take away about 15 or 20 singles, which would still leave him as a .300 hitter.
So, we have a player who has shown the ability to be an upper level talent and will likely continue to be, is a free agent at the age of 25, and plays a position of great need for the Mariners. He’s tremendous offensively and defensively. A 7 year contract doesn’t commit you into his decline phase. And because of his mediocre seasons from 2001-2003, he’s going to come at a bit of a discount, compared to the other upper echelon free agents.
He’s just about the perfect free agent for this team. Sign him. Sign him now.
Guardado Returns
Eddie Guarado took less than 24 hours to exercise his player option for 2005, an absolute no-brainer of a move, quite honestly. There’s just no way he was getting $4.5 million on the open market with the concerns about his health.
Also, Bret Boone and Ichiro were awarded gold gloves today, further cementing that honors place as the most ludicrous of all the hardware handed out.
Bowden takes DC job, Gillick.. ?
AP is reporting that Jim Bowden, former GM of the Reds, will be the new GM of the to-be-renamed-Expos. I once named Bowden the most disappointing GM to me, but that’s not really important.
What it means is that Gillick, who weirdly hasn’t left yet, doesn’t get the job. Presumably he’ll continue to cash pay paychecks until one of his old proteges gives him a gig, like Bavasi did for Evans. At some point this off-season, though, I totally agree with Dave in that I expect Gillick to leave the team.
Guardado
The Mariners declined their 2005 option on Eddie Guardado today. I’ve already gotten a couple of emails wondering why the team doesn’t want him back; relax, he’ll be a Mariner next year. We’ve been telling you the team would do this for two months. There’s no way Guardado gets $4.5 million on the open market. I’d be surprised if it took him more than a couple of days to pick up his player option.
Off-season to-do list
I’ve been asked “So what are you going to do in the off-season?”
A brief summary:
– spend time with the Mrs.
– write my chapters for Baseball Prospectus 2005
– research, writing for Secret Project 1, details forthcoming
– research, writing for Secret Project 2, details not forthcoming
– improve the site some more
– possibly launch bizarre, ill-fated site features
– research stocks
– read books
– play video games
I also may watch some football.
The off-season doesn’t do a lot to lighten my workload. Anyway, back to the keyboard.